Mount Gravatt Environment Group

Hard workers (l-r) Sienna, Lara, Indya, Dan, Alex, Shiori, Abraham

By: Michael Fox

The Griffith Mates team joined Fox Gully Bushcare again in March. It is always fascinating to have team around. I listened to two students, one from Norway and one from China, who have never met before, having an in-depth discussion of the Chinese economy while pulling weeds in the Australian bush.

Scorpion-tailed Spiders Arachnura higginsi

The students are always interested in the wildlife as well. It can be checking Squirrel Gliders in the nest boxes or like this time finding an interesting spider or beetle.

Snail-eating Carabid Pamborus alternans

Scorpion-tailed Spiders Arachnura higginsi are a curious Orbweaver spider. Female Scorpion-tailed spiders develop a long tail that can be arched over the head must like a scorpion’s attack position. This female Scorpion-tailed Spider is the first I have found in the Mt Gravatt Conservation Reserve and a new addition to our Flora & Fauna list.

The team also discovered a Snail-eating Carabid Pamborus alternans which has not been recorded before in the reserve. These beetles live under logs and feed on snails and earthworms.

A great team effort … two new species found and fourteen bags of Fishbone Fern Nephrolepis cordifolia roots removed from site. We concentrate on removing the roots because the leaves have very few fertile leaves to spread spores.This invasive environmental weed is typically spread by dumping of garden waste in bushland. The industry website Grow Me Instead lists alternative garden plants all of which are indigenous to Fox Gully  – Gristle Fern Blechnum cartilagineum, Rasp Fern Doodia aspera and Rough Maidenhair Fern Adiantum hispidulum.